‘No place for corruption within security agencies’ – UK Diplomat
-Investigators undergo anti- bribery, corruption training
Investigators from lead security agencies in the fight against corruption today commenced a two-week Financial Investigation and Anti-Corruption training, which is funded by the Government of the United Kingdom through the Special Adviser attached to the Special Organised Crime Unit (SOCU), Dr Sam Sittlington.
The training will focus mainly on fraud, bribery and corruption. Week one will concentrate on investigative methods for fraud and week two will focus on occurrences of bribery.
British High Commissioner to Guyana, Greg Quinn in his remarks, charged the participants to operate at the highest standards in order to gain the trust of the public.
“There is no place for corruption within security agencies in Guyana. If officials or individuals cannot work with honesty and integrity, then they should be…prosecuted and imprisoned as necessary.
“If people don’t like the sound of that, then frankly – tough – security agencies cannot expect respect and cooperation from the public if they themselves are not willing to operate within and be subject to the law. All of you can and must set the examples for everyone to follow,” the British diplomat said.
The training will be conducted by two UK experts with a combined 60 years experience in anti-money laundering and fraud investigations.
The two weeks of activities are targeting 14 SOCU investigators, nine officers from the Criminal Investigations Department (CID), two Customs Anti-Narcotics (CANU) Investigators, an officer from the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) and four persons from the State Assets Recovery Agency (SARA).
Attorney General and Minister of Legal Affairs, Basil Williams in his remarks, spoke about the Government’s war against corruption in all forms.
“Government has been doing its part by conducting anti-corruption and sensitization seminars in the various administrative regions of the country, which have had a significant impact on cases of misappropriation of state assets.
“I can venture without any fear of successful contradiction that since we entered into government, we have not experienced any case of the scale of those we inherited and revealed by those forensic audits.”
According to the Attorney General, corruption must be exposed and the anti-corruption laws must be enforced.
Also attending the event were Minister of Public Security, Khemraj Ramjattan and Police Commissioner (ag), David Ramnarine.
